Mojang Incorporates Community-Created Feature Into Minecraft
A flying machine using sticky slime blocks, invented by the ZipKrowd.
The Minecraft 1.8 update will bring many changes and additions to the game, but one change is just a little more special than the others. The first preview snapshot for Minecraft 1.8 revealed the new slime block that was being added to the game, allowing players to fall onto it from any height and bounce, rather than take fall damage. However, one of the most prominent members of the Minecraft community on YouTube, docm77, and his group of friends known as the ZipKrowd, imagined something better for the slime block.
The ZipKrowd worked tirelessly in secret on code that would give the slime block a new property: stickiness. Acting very similar to the already existing sticky pistons, the modification to the slime block would allow it to push and pull multiple blocks at a time, even when driven by only a single piston. This seemingly simple change allows for many possibilities in new inventions and gadgets designs within the game. Realizing they had a great idea, docm77 made use of his connections to get what the ZipKrowd had done in front of one of the developers at Mojang: Nathan Adams AKA Dinnerbone.
Dinnerbone and the rest of the developers at Mojang liked the sticky slime block so much that they asked the ZipKrowd if it would be okay to use their code and add the sticky slime block into the official build of Minecraft. The ZipKrowd guys agreed, and now everyone in the Minecraft community can play around with the new block as of Snapshot version 14w18a.
It seems that the Minecraft community has already embraced the sticky slime block. People have created various flying machines, boat launchers, minecart jugglers, compact slime doors, slime elevators, and many new inventions incorporating the sticky slime block after just a couple days of availability. Minecraft 1.8 may still be in the preview stage at this point, but it is already a resounding success.
The story of how the sticky slime block came into existence is yet another example of how passionate the Minecraft community is about their game and how Mojang is one of the best developers out there when it comes to interacting with their community. Perhaps other developers out there should take a few notes.